I LOVED THIS ISSUE!!! I was basically this chick in the background the entire time I was reading it:

Why did I love this issue so much? Medusa, Queen of the Fucking Inhumans, wrapped her glorious, prehensile mane of red hair around Kamala to protect her while teleporting EVEN THOUGH HER PREVIOUS CONTACT WITH KAMALA WAS JUST A PICTURE OF HER EATING A GYRO. Bruno sprinted and leaped over a damn cop to be near Kamala when she got hurt. Star Wars references. Kamala finally learned she was an Inhuman and left Attilan against Medusa's wishes, and her doctor didn't even stop her fully knowing Medusa and her glorious hair will kick his ass. People pointing out the sacrifices Kamala is making to beat the inventor, one which is probably even diminishing her powers, that she can't keep being so reckless and endangering herself. Kamala then being reckless and finding out something super important about the kids being used as the Inventor's stash. ALSO KAMALA HAS A STUFFED ANIMAL OF A WINGED TWO-TOED SLOTH IN HER ROOM AND I WANT ONE

My brother gave me this book as a birthday present as a joke. So months later I picked this up expecting something trashy, something that would be the plot to a Lifetime movie.

My Sweet Audrina would make a hell of a Lifetime movie, but it isn't the fun trash I expected. It was just super fucked up with a shitty ending. I won't tell you whether to read this or not, but here are a list of triggers just in case you are intrigued:

Our narrator of this adorable tale wants a pet more than anything in the world, and the only pet that meets her mother's qualifications is the sloth. After she has Sparky mailed to her, she just wants people to love him as much as she does. Thus she makes several failed attempts at teaching Sparky tricks where he makes the same face I always made in gym class:

Eventually our narrator realizes that it doesn't matter if people find Sparky impressive, because she loves him and that's all that matters.

Let it be known that even after being told she wrote fanfiction about him and published it on the internet, that Wolverine stans Kamala so much that he gets his friends to fall in love with her by only showing them a picture of her eating a gyro. Hopefully Kamala won't die of joy once she finds out!

I won this books through a Goodreads Giveaway, which does not impact my review.

When I read a biography about a woman I tend to suspect that I will also be reading about her family, specifically her male relatives, because of the fact that more often than we want, women's lives were recorded in relation to the men the lives. If a historian encounters letters, or even better a diary, written by their female subject they are lucky. Otherwise they have to sift through countless records looking for the even the most minute evidence of the woman's name, or a relative, or a place, etc. before finally deciding if this record is even relevant. Considering that Sarah Losh burned her diaries and that she was fairly unknown outside her locale, Jenny Uglow had to do quite a bit of sifting. Unfortunately, a lot of the content Uglow included, to me anyway, seemed to lack some relevancy to the story of Sarah Losh and her church, especially in the first half of the book. When this happens, it feels like you're reading filler. The strongest parts of The Pinecone were when Uglow wrote about what would later influence Sarah's plans for her church at Wreay, and then when she began the construction of her church. Sarah's visit to Pompei was great to read about, not only because we had a first person account to go off of, but because through her personal account you could see the seed being planted in Sarah's brain which would sprout and influence the design of the church in Wreay. I really wanted to rate this book higher, because Sarah Losh is as deeply fascinating as her architecture, but there were just too many pages that seemed like they were in the wrong biography.

I really like where this new storyline is going, it's such a shame that the art inside is sooooooo terrible! Normally on here when reading comics I tend to critique the writing, but good lord the art is such an eye-sore it's distracting. Seriously it feels like Marvel is purposely trying to sabotage this series -_-

To think that I waited so long to read Saga because I interpreted the "two people trying to raise a baby" description as boring and sitcom-y. Thankfully I was so, so wrong. Gorgeous artwork, fantastic characters each with their own interesting storyline. 5 out of 5 stars

The thing about She-Hulk is that no matter how chaotic her life as an attorney/superhero can get, she will always have her shit together. Now that Doctor Doom has entered the mix, the balancing act of She-Hulk's two careers is about to get even trickier. But I'm not reading these comics wondering how she will manage her double life, I'm reading these precisely because I know that not only will Jennifer make this task look effortless, but she'll make her enemies look like fools while doing so.

Teresa of Avila wrote Interior Castle as a way to explain her theory about the soul. I have to admit, the idea of the soul being a castle shaped crystal housing seven mansions inside is pretty cool. The imagery of the soul-crystal darkening after being touched by Lucifer was striking as well. As a person who never fully understood the mystic branches of the Abrahamic faiths, I found the mysticism offered here is fairly accessible. However, the multiple comparisons of disabled individuals to a sinner or a person not reaching their full spiritual potential was beyond gross. Yes, I am fully aware this text was written in the sixteenth century, but that doesn't excuse the ableist language (or dashes of internalized misogyny). It never ceases to amaze me how many Christian works blatantly go against the tolerance Christ preached. 1.5 out of 5 stars

"To His Excellency Sr. Henry Moore, Bart., captain general and governour in chief, in & over the Province of New York & the territories depending thereon in America, chancellor & vice admiral of the same, this plan of the city of New York, is most humbly inscribed" (1776)

From the introduction:

"The New York Public Library have made available online, free from all restrictions, high resolution copies of more than 20,000 historic maps. Containing maps from the 16th through to the early 20th century, the collection focuses mainly on the United States, particularly New York, but also features maps from other countries. The images of Manhattan and surrounding boroughs offer a fascinating snapshot of the development of one of the most densely populated areas in the world. The maps can be viewed through the New York Public Library’s Digital Collections page, and downloaded, through the Map Warper – a wonderful project which aims to make historic maps viewable as overlays on modern maps."

For some reason it has been increasingly difficult for me to find books where the main relationship for the teenage female protagonist is not a goddamn all-consuming romance. Not that I'm saying that romance is bad, because it can be wonderful, but I was just getting sick of that type of book, especially after hearing old classmates exasperating about their publishers forcing them to shoehorn it in their manuscripts (like what happened with The Hunger Games trilogy). Thankfully, Tell the Wolves I'm Home fell into my lap.

Tell the Wolves I'm Home tells the story of fourteen year old June Elbus, a girl who just wants to wear her boots in the woods and pretend she is in the middle ages, and how her life is altered once her favorite person, her Uncle Finn, succumbs from AIDS in 1987. After Finn dies June meets Toby, her uncle's boyfriend of nearly ten years that she never knew he had, and tries to keep their growing friendship clandestine from her family. Carol Rifka Brunt brilliantly tackles the complexities of the relationships June has with the people in her life, how they can change in equally wonderful and terrible ways. For me, the stand out relationship examined is the one between June and her big sister Greta, who is hurting just as much as June, but for different reasons. It is a testament to Brunt that she never shied away from letting Greta be just as complicated as June, instead of just staying the flat "Mean Big Sister" trope, which as the older sister in my own family I deeply appreciate.

This book made me ache with nostalgia, not for the setting (I wasn't even born yet) but at the memory of losing certain parts of yourself that happens with growing up, or how learning one thing about a person can change the way you view her forever. Tell the Wolves I'm Home is a stunning read, and if you can deal with the aches, you'll find yourself seeing the beauty through the pain, just like sunshine after the rain. 5 out of 5 stars.

For some reason it has been increasingly difficult for me to find books where the main relationship for the teenage female protagonist is not a goddamn all-consuming romance. Not that I'm saying that romance is bad, because it can be wonderful, but I was just getting sick of that type of book, especially after hearing old classmates exasperating about their publishers forcing them to shoehorn it in their manuscripts (like what happened with The Hunger Games trilogy). Thankfully, Tell the Wolves I'm Home fell into my lap.

Tell the Wolves I'm Home tells the story of fourteen year old June Elbus, a girl who just wants to wear her boots in the woods and pretend she is in the middle ages, and how her life is altered once her favorite person, her Uncle Finn, succumbs from AIDS in 1987. After Finn dies June meets Toby, her uncle's boyfriend of nearly ten years that she never knew he had, and tries to keep their growing friendship clandestine from her family. Carol Rifka Brunt brilliantly tackles the complexities of the relationships June has with the people in her life, how they can change in equally wonderful and terrible ways. For me, the stand out relationship examined is the one between June and her big sister Greta, who is hurting just as much as June, but for different reasons. It is a testament to Brunt that she never shied away from letting Greta be just as complicated as June, instead of just staying the flat "Mean Big Sister" trope, which as the older sister in my own family I deeply appreciate.

This book made me ache with nostalgia, not for the setting (I wasn't even born yet) but at the memory of losing certain parts of yourself that happens with growing up, or how learning one thing about a person can change the way you view her forever. Tell the Wolves I'm Home is a stunning read, and if you can deal with the aches, you'll find yourself seeing the beauty through the pain, just like sunshine after the rain. 5 out of 5 stars.

Absolutely fantastic writing and artwork, just as expected after a phenomenal first issue. Once again Wilson tackles multiple themes such as being a child of immigrants, growing up Muslim in a community with little understanding of Islam, and western beauty ideals by weaving them together forming Kamala's own tapestry of her identity. As if these weren't enough threads, Kamala finds herself with a new thread of emerged shape-shifting superpowers, which definitely aren't as fun or liberating as she imagined, and before she is finished processing this she has to decide if she should save the ignorant Zoe or let her drown. It is this decision which tells us readers exactly what kind of person Kamala is, even if she herself hasn't quite figured it out yet. 5 out of 5 stars.